Skip to content
Dom Robinson reviews
Universal Pictures Video
- Cert:
- Cat.no: 8227463
- Running time: 114 minutes
- Year: 2004
- Pressing: 2004
- Region(s): 2, PAL
- Chapters: 28 plus extras
- Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
- Languages: English
- Subtitles: English
- Widescreen: 2.35:1
- 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
- Macrovision: Yes
- Disc Format: DVD 9
- Price: £19.99
- Extras: Riddick’s World, Interactive 360° view of 8 different sets from the film, Virtual Guide To The Chronicles ofRiddick, Toombs Chase Log, Riddick Inside Facts On Demand, The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Baygame demo, Trailers
Director:
- David Twohy
(The Arrival, Below, The Chronicles of Riddick, Pitch Black, Timescape)
Producer:
- Camille Brown, Vin Diesel & Scott Kroopf
Screenplay:
- David Twohy
Music:
- Graeme Revell and Tim Simonec
Cast:
- Shaun: Simon Pegg
Liz: Kate Ashfield
Ed: Nick Frost
Dianne: Lucy Davis
David: Dylan Moran
Pete: Peter Serafinowicz
Philip: Bill Nighy
Barbara: Penelope Winton
Yvonne: Jessica Stevenson
The Chronicles of Riddick,along with the other follow-ups and spin-offs fromPitch Black,namely, the animatedDark Furyand the exception Xbox outing,Escape From Butcher Bay,all came about because of the success of Pitch Black when it reached DVD, as the wordof mouth had spread since its theatrical run, turning a cult hit into a viable franchise.Hence, according to theInternet Movie Database,David Twohy wrote three screenplay sequels, put them into separate leather binders and presentedthem to Universal with the key for the first one only.
This movie gets off with a perfect start with Riddick (Vin Diesel) in full flow as his fiveyears of peace on Planet UV 6 is disturbed with a jolt as the bane of his life, Toombs (NickChinlund) tracks him down and attempts to capture him and take him to a nearby jail so he’ll be quidsin. Hence, a similar storyline to the aforementioned Xbox game where Toombs drops him off at Butcher Bay.
Of course, Riddick has other plans, takes control of Toombs’ ship in spectacular style and heads off forHelion Prime to see his friend from the first movie, holy man Imam (Keith David), now living in theNew Mecca district, because there’s only he who knew where Riddick was going to be hiding out.
Before they can get well-acquainted, there’s a huge disturbance of epic proportions, explosions aplentyand Riddick finds himself trapped in a war between the Necromongers, led by Lord Marshal (Colm Feore),and the Elementals, led by Aereon (Judi Dench, an unlikely choice for a sci-fi actioner, but she’sthe 70-year-old actress Vin Diesel himself fought hard for to get the part), and Riddick’s the only man whocan put a stop to things.
Vin and Thandie looked in the mirror and
were curious about what Linus Roach was staring at…
It’s not a spoiler to state that Toombs will track Riddick down again and stick his oar in where it’snot wanted, thus getting caught up in a situation he far from understands, but he’s blinded by theprospect of mucho money in return for checking him in at the worst prison of all, Crematoria, where thesurface burns and is too hot to touch.
With Vin Diesel back as the titular hero, and let’s face it – the series couldn’t be made without him,he packs a punch when required and is as sarky as hell – just like in the Butcher Bay game, doingfor this franchise what Bruce Willis did for the Die Hard movies.
Colm Feore, a name I hadn’t heard of before, puts in a suitably snarling performance as the main baddie,Lord Marshal, leader of the Necromongers, backed up by his right-hand man, Vaako (Karl Urban), whois married to Dame Vaako (the ever-gorgeous Thandie Newton, despite this time being constantly corsettedup in a figure-hugging dress and not getting to show off any flesh like she did copiously in the action-comedyGridlock’d).
The daily commute to the film set would’ve been easier
had Vin Diesel been given a same limo like everyone else.
So, what is a Necromonger? They want to convert or kill every last human life. Converters will head off tothe Underverse, which is bandied about like the day of reckoning, and the only thing that’ll stop the evilplan would be if a Furyan warrior could be found, since they’re the only race they fear. Now guess whatrace Riddick turns out to be? Ok, now you see why he’s been drawn in here, having been encouraged by Aereon.Yes, it’s a typical storyline of lone renegade getting caught up in a war between two sides, but it workshere so I won’t complain.
About Judi Dench, well she’s a long-established actress but here she just talks to everyone in thesimilarly bossy tone she talks to Pierce Brosnan in hisJames Bondmovies. All the rest of the cast get on with their job in their own way, but it’s a point of note thatJack, played by Rhiana Griffith in the first one, has become Kyra (Alexa Davalos), pronounced ‘Kee-ra’.Rhiana was one of the final names in the auditions but Vin told her she needed to “toughen up” and the shortamount of time left to train didn’t play fair to her, so the role went to Ms Davalos.
Despite the fact I’ve given it 7/10 overall, The Chronicles of Riddick is what sci-fiaction/adventure should be about, not like the recent nonsense that was therecent Star Wars films.There’s seamless CGI – pretty nifty too when it comes to Riddick’s final fight with Lord Marshal,but I feel spoiled by having played the ‘Butcher Bay’ game as that felt like a perfect interactiveversion of a Riddick movie. That said, I can’t wait for the forthcoming two sequels.
The film is presented in its original 2.35:1 theatrical ratio and is anamorphic. It looks colourfuland striking throughout, although it does lose a star for whatever the mastering defect is that leavesit looking a little bit sticky at times. The sound comes in Dolby Digital 5.1 only (wot no DTS that UniversalDVDs are often famous for?), but still rocks the house, particularly late at night with one explosionand fight after another.
The movie’s wrap party was an emotional time for all.
The whole DVD is preceeded by two sets of menus: ‘Convert’ and ‘Fight’, a very nice touch, andthe extras are as follows but they’re rather disappointing overall because they’re more style oversubstance:
- Virtual Guide to The Chronicles of Riddick (9½ mins):Individual pieces of info about everything important within the film, from the Necromongers and Elementalsto Helion Prime and New Mecca, all read by various members of the cast.
- Toombs’ Chase Log (10 mins):Thankfully this time, unlike with the first Bridget Jones movie, Universal know where the apostrophe goesin the cast of a possessive pronoun. That aside, this is snippets of dialogue from Toombs, but the downsideis that the accompanying visuals just look random because they don’t fit in with the chat.
- Riddick Insider: Facts on Demand:With this option selected, when you watch the movie again you’ll get trivia info displayed onscreen. A nicealternative to an audio commentary, since that’s not present.
- Visual Effects Revealed (6 mins):But not many of them as there’s scores within the movie and only six minutes to talk about all of them?It’s a brief diversion but nothing you couldn’t work out for yourself.
- Riddick’s Worlds (3 mins plus interactivity):An incredibly brief tour of the sets, followed by a 360o look around eight locations, in thatyou press left or right to look at the next segment in a 90o turn rather than a Myst-stylefully-interactive environment.
- Xbox ‘Escape From Butcher Bay’ demo:A few brief snatches from the game to give you an idea of how it plays (in 4:3 only, whereas the full gamewill detect if you have a widescreen set-up), but it’s bloody fantastic.Check out the review.,
- Trailers:None for this movie, surprisingly, but just ones forPitch Black,Dark Fury,Van Helsing, Billy Elliot: The Musical and The Bourne Supremacy,the latter of which is out in late January and I’m really looking forward to it after the excellentThe Bourne Identity.
Basic subtitles are in English only, there are 28 chapters and two menu system as explained previously.However, what I wish Universal would NOT do is make the disc always default to running the movie againafter it’s been left for a short while.
PICTURE QUALITY
SOUND QUALITY
EXTRAS
OVERALL
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.